Saturday, March 11, 2006

A lot of people have asked me about Mom, so I'll share the latest update with you.

It's been a grueling week to be sure. But there is light at the end of the tunnel. I can't possibly respond to everyone individually, so I'm sending it out to the loop.

Mom was moved out of the ER early Thursday morning and admitted into the hospital. She waited in what is called the "observation ward" for a room for the rest of the night and most of Thursday, with a few more tests run, but not much. Finally, she was given a room around 5pm Thursday night and we went to go see her that evening. She looked good, her low-grade fever was gone, and the antibiotics they're giving her eliminated all her pain. Praise the Lord!

The only difficult part that night was a tube inserted through her nose down to her stomach to empty out the contents of her stomach (fluids and bile, etc.) in a slow process overnight. Needless to say, she didn't get much sleep. But I just spoke to her this morning and she said her doctor didn't either that night (analyzing test reports and data to isolate the cause of her infection), so I suppose turnaround is fair play. Still haven't identified the cause. Seesawing between possible appendicitis, small ulcer, lower intestinal problems or even salmonella poisoning.

They're going to run another CAT scan tomorrow and she'll most likely be coming home on Monday. Then, she'll remain on antibiotics for 2-3 weeks to make sure all infection is gone. At that time, they might decide to pull the appendix anyway and possibly go in with a scope of some sort to take a look at everything.

In the meantime, she has her Bible and devotionals, 2 fiction books and some humor books to keep her occupied. She's also received several visitors and of course enduring the interruptions of the nurses every 2 hours to check her vitals. And they expect you to get some sleep? How?

God always has His reasons, and He doesn't always share them with us. But perhaps this is a time for her to spend communing with Him and drawing closer without all of life's day-to-day distractions. He's given me and our family definite pieace about it all, and I wanted to share the latest.